"The spiritual eyes see beneath all physical matter to the place where everything in the universe is interconnected in a divine cosmic dance. When I see, express, and interact in harmony with the vision of my spiritual eyes, transformation flows and miracles happen."
-- From inspiring essay titled Spiritual Eyes by Fred Burks

Spiritual Eyes

Gazing in fertile silence deep into Zora's inviting eyes, I touch her divine core as she touches mine. Enthralled with the wordless mystery we see in these liquid depths, energetic shivers run up our spines in an ecstasy of knowing the unknown. I see my Self in her eyes. She sees the unlimited potential of her Self in mine. My entire being quakes as I dive so deep through Zora's eyes that I can see our souls as one in the sacred space where all beings are intimately interconnected. I am awakening to something profound. We are awakening to something incredibly profound. We are powerfully reminding each other of who we are in the most expansive levels of being.

Riding my bicycle the next day to Bikram yoga class, the timeless soul connection with Zora still reverberates strongly in my body and soul. On my way to this intense, 90-minute session of 105 degree heat which I enjoy once a month, I remember how I love to set an intention for exploration each time I attend. I find that when I set a clear intention beforehand, I often have rich inspirations arise in class as we stretch beyond our comfort zones.

I decide in today's class to explore what is awakening in me in my deepening connection with Zora. How can I bring what I'm learning with her to other parts of my life? How can I see into the eyes of others in the same way I see into Zora's? Yes, that's it! How can I better see that vibrant divine essence, that universal core that I see so clearly in Zora in everyone I meet? That's my intention for exploration in this session.

After some warm up stretching, the intense heat begins to penetrate. My entire body loosens and opens as I begin to push the stretches to my limit. Before long, my heart is pounding and sweat pours from my body. It's a most strange and delicious kind of self torture that I actually love. Any thoughts but making it through this yoga posture vanish from my mind. When I stand up or raise my body, the blood rushes out of my head and at times I almost faint. Yet it is often in these intense, mindless moments when powerful realizations arise from within.

Opening to that swirling, blissful place of pure being as I finish one challenging pose, suddenly I get it! I get the answer to my question about seeing the divine essence in all. I'm thrilled to realize that I have two pairs of eyes! We all have two pairs of eyes!!!

We have our physical eyes which see the three-dimensional world around us. Yet we also have another unseen pair of eyes. They are energetic or spiritual eyes. These eyes are grounded in the place deep within each of us which knows that we are all interconnected. The spiritual eyes see beneath all physical matter to the place where everything in the universe is interconnected in a divine cosmic dance.

Yes!!! In this instant, I see that though I've never before realized that I have these invisible, energetic eyes, I have been gradually developing my spiritual eyes for years. With these divine eyes, I am cultivating the ability to see profound depths and beautiful vibrance in every person I meet. I get it! These are the eyes within me that drank in pure bliss and sublime ecstasy upon gazing through Zora's physical eyes to connect with her divine essence. Gazing into her soul, these eyes saw my own soul reflected back to me in a most mysterious and magical way.

When these spiritual eyes look out at the physical world, they see beneath solid form. They pierce the veil of separation to see the energetic manifestations emanating from the divine essence of all beings. They see a vast sea of energy flowing, of which each of us is an intimately interconnected part. All is received by these spiritual eyes simply and gloriously as it is. In this expanded awareness where the divine vibration is equally strong in all beings, the core energetic essence of everyone and everything magically shines through.

When two beings gaze into each other through these spiritual eyes, the mysteries of the universe become apparent. The great wonder of the unknown is seen in its ever-changing form. That is why my gazing and diving with Zora was so intense, so intoxicating, so transformative in our time together yesterday. As I gaze deep into her with my spiritual eyes and she deep into me, the divine is given the opportunity to look at and explore itself through these eyes, and magic cannot help but happen.

As my body surrenders further to the intense heat and stretching of each successive yoga posture, I feel such deep gratitude: gratitude to Zora for opening to this experience with me; gratitude to Bikram Choudhury for creating this intense, unusual form of yoga which is so powerfully inspiring for me; gratitude to myself for being willing to open not only my spiritual eyes, but my heart and soul to All That Is; gratitude to the divinity that we all are for inviting me to dance with its mysteries. Thank you One and thank you All.

Near the end of the session as I stretch deep into camel pose – the most intense pose of the class – I nearly faint as my awareness again expands and soars. I feel so fully the exquisite depths of my being, of all beings merging with my expanded consciousness. And then suddenly, I'm surprised to see yet another pair of energetic eyes! This time it's the sexual eyes. Wow!!! Now that's an entirely different ball game! A soulful laugh echoes silently within as I acknowledge that yes, Zora is a vibrant, gorgeous woman and being. And I know this somehow plays a role in what I'm experiencing with her.

I realize that the sexual eyes are quite different from both the physical and the spiritual eyes. These desiring eyes see and look for that which awakens the powerful love hormones in our bodies. Ever longing for rich, indescribable feelings of ecstatic union and connection, these passionate eyes completely bypass the mind and are connected to a part of our awareness which can be quite irrational. The intensity of feeling they bring can cause us to lose contact with both our rationality and our spirituality.

When these sexual eyes see certain body shapes, facial features, or body parts which excite a hormonal response, all other eyes can become blind with the passionate desire to connect intimately that is such a core part of the human experience. Sex seems almost designed physiologically to entangle us in its web. It forces us into rich dramas where we are gifted with potent opportunities to learn more about ourselves and life through opening more deeply to another soul than we ever would without these powerful hormones raging inside us.

Zora and I have not been connecting sexually in any physical way. Yet how fascinating, how intriguing that when I'm with her my sexual eyes are open and engaged, yet my spiritual eyes are also fully open and engaged. With her, the two seem to work in tandem, drawing me even deeper into a mystery which I don't comprehend, yet which paradoxically imparts deep wisdom that somehow heals me into ever greater wholeness. I am in awe that my spiritual eyes and my sexual eyes can work so beautifully in harmony. Together, they are opening universes filled with infinite possibilities for growth and expansion.

Riding my bicycle back home from this most beautiful, most powerful Bikram session, I am thrilled with this newfound awareness of my energetic eyes. With my spiritual eyes, I see the physical world flowing gracefully past me. The colorful houses, trees, streets, and people passing through my field of vision all shimmer magnificently as I see beyond the three dimensions of my normal vision. The universe is dancing for me as it shows off the divine energetic essence in everything around me. I see vibrance and resonance in everyone and everything, which reflects the divine sensations I feel welling up from deep within my soul.

As I arrive home after this unbelievably rich journey, I sense a new beginning. I sense a new awakening – or is it really just a remembering – of who I am in this world, of who we are, and what we are doing here. Opening for the first time to the miraculous abilities of my spiritual eyes, I see so much more clearly now how I can use these eyes to dance with the radiant divine essence, with the resplendent universal core in everyone I meet.

I now embrace more fully than ever the divine mystery that I Am, that We Are. I know that the more I choose to use my spiritual eyes, the more intimately I feel connected with each person around me, and the more I experience on a most profound level the interconnectedness of all beings in this divine cosmic dance of life. I make a conscious decision to use these eyes as often as I can now as I move through life. I still don't know the answers to life's deepest mysteries, yet I know that when I see, express, and interact in harmony with the vision of my spiritual eyes, transformation flows and miracles happen.

Note: Zora and I eventually went on to share a full year of profoundly transformative connection together. We were both amazed that we almost never had any problems and flowed with such ease and passion together. Yet after a year, a couple big issues began to surface. About a year an a half later Zora pulled way back and no longer wanted to connect with me. Though I was very sad at the loss, I realized this was an opportunity to open more my energetic eyes with everyone I meet to what I saw (and still see) in Zora's eyes. And even though we connect very little now, Zora and I are both deeply grateful for the experience we shared together.

For more: For a beautiful and most profound essay which helped me to open to this experience, click here. For a few short, inspiring poems about life and love I wrote, click here. For the Divine Mystery website I've put together which explores some of life's deepest mysterys, click here.